This invention relates to greaseless cooking of food products. More particularly, it relates to methods and apparatus for rapidly cooking food products with simultaneous radiant heating and forced air convection heating.
Quickly prepared food products (often referred to as fast foods) are conventionally prepared on-site using various commercial cooking devices such as deep-fat fryers, grills, convection ovens, radiant heat ovens, rotisseries and the like. However, deep-fat frying and grilling raw meat on an open grill or pit is relatively dangerous since hot oils and fats are potential fire hazards and dangerous to personnel. Equipment for safely cooking such items typically requires a vented hood system which draws grease-laden vapor and smoke from the cooking equipment through filters and stainless steel ductwork to an external exhaust. Such vented hood systems usually include a fire extinguisher system and thus are expensive to install and maintain. Because of the increased risk of fire, operators of such systems generally incur expensive fire insurance premiums. Accordingly, operators of fast food restaurants, sports arenas, amusement parks and other operations which sell fast foods are always searching for better ways to cook food faster, cleaner, more safely and less expensively.
Commercial food processors now offer many menu items (some partially cooked) which can be prepared for serving in a convection oven. Since these menu items are designed to be prepared either in an oven, in a deep-fat fryer or on a grill, they have been widely accepted and the quality and number of such products have improved and increased substantially. However, food products such as battered items (which are usually best when fried) and meats (which are usually best when grilled) suffer in quality when prepared in an ordinary convection oven. The fried type products are often not as crisp as desired and the ordinarily grilled items are not as juicy and tender as they would be if grilled. Although menu items such as french fries, chicken strips, hamburgers, etc., are highly desireable, many fast food operations do not offer such items because of the increased expense and risk associated with the equipment necessary to properly prepare them on-site. There is, therefore, an ever-increasing need for food preparation equipment which does not require use of hot oils or the like and which does not require hoods or other systems to control and remove vapors, etc., generated by the cooking process, but which can quickly and safely cook menu items which ordinarily require deep-fat frying or grilling.